Philippine President Rodrigo
Duterte has said he stabbed a person to death as a teenager, in a defiant
speech to promote his drug war ahead of a summit of world leaders in Manila.

Speaking to the local Filipino
community in the Vietnamese city of Danang on Thursday, Duterte also threatened
to slap a UN rights rapporteur if he met her, and used obscene language to hit
back at critics of his deadly drugs crackdown.

“When I was a teenager, I would
go in and out of jail. I’d have rumbles here, rumbles there,” said Duterte, who
is in Danang for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.

“At the age of 16, I already
killed someone. A real person, a rumble, a stabbing. I was just 16 years old.
It was just over a look. How much more now that I am president?”

Duterte won last year’s
presidential elections after promising to eradicate illegal drugs with an
unprecedented crackdown that would see up to 100,000 people killed.

Since he took office 16 months
ago, police say they have killed 3,967 people in the crackdown. Another 2,290
people were murdered in drug-related crimes, while thousands of other deaths
remain unsolved, according to government data.

Duterte, 72, remains popular with
many Filipinos who believe he is making society safer.

But critics at home and abroad
warn that he is orchestrating a campaign of extrajudicial mass murder, carried
out by corrupt police and hired vigilantes.

He at times denies inciting
police or others to kill, but also consistently generates headlines for his
abusive language and incendiary comments defending the drug war.

Duterte said last year he would
be “happy to slaughter” three million drug addicts and branded then US
president Barack Obama a “son of a whore” for criticising the drug war.

Duterte also said in December
last year that he had personally shot dead criminal suspects when he was mayor
of southern Davao city to set an example for the police.

His then spokesman later sought
to clarify the remarks, saying those killings were during a “legitimate police
action”.

– Killer, or killer jokes –

Esquire magazine quoted Duterte
as saying in an interview before he became president that he “maybe” stabbed
someone to death when he was 17 years old, in what may be a reference to the
incident described in Danang.

In an election campaign rally
Duterte also said he was expelled from college for shooting a fellow student
who was insulting him. The victim reportedly survived.

Duterte’s aides have repeatedly
told journalists not to believe everything the president says, cautioning that
he often jokes or indulges in “hyperbole”.

His new spokesman, Harry Roque,
indicated that may be the case with his stabbing-to-death claim.

“I think it was in jest. The Pres
uses colourful language when w Pinoys (Filipinos) overseas,” Roque said in a
text message.

In Danang, Duterte also targeted
the United Nations’ special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, Agnes
Callamard, who has been a frequent critic of the drug war.

“This rapporteur,” he said, after
referring to Callamard by name. “I will slap her in front of you. Why? Because
you are insulting me.”

Duterte’s latest comments come
ahead of him hosting US President Donald Trump and other leaders for the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit.

Trump is due to fly into Manila
from Vietnam along with many other leaders on Sunday evening, ahead of two days
of talks.

Trump has praised Duterte’s
handling of the drug war, telling the Philippine leader in a telephone call in
April that he was doing a “great job”.

Human rights campaigners have
said the summit will be a public relations coup for Duterte, with Trump and
other leaders expected to ignore the drug war controversy.

“Duterte will enjoy the gift of
tacit silence from East Asian leaders on his murderous drug war during the
upcoming summit,” Human Rights Watch deputy Asia director Phelim Kine told AFP.

Adding to a sense of supreme
confidence ahead of the event, Duterte on Thursday also proposed hosting a
global summit on human rights in which all nations would be placed under the
microscope.

“Let us investigate all
violations of human rights committed by all governments,” he said, specifically
naming the United States, France and Russia.